Let me preface this by saying that my main RP character on Alliance side has been on-and-off active on Wyrmrest Accord since Wrath. I’ve also made a couple RP-focused characters on Moon Guard, primarily to dip my toes into the community and get a feel for the overall atmosphere there. However, after this, I’m still unsure about which is truly better for an overall engaging Alliance RP experience. I do plan to transfer over 3 characters from WRA to MG if I come to the conclusion that MG is the better option, but I want to make sure I’m not suffering from ‘grass is greener on the other side’ syndrome before I make the final call.
Here’s a couple of my opinions on the two realms, and points in their favor as well as against that I’m trying to work through, and I’d love to have a second opinion from folks who have more experience than I. It’s quite possible these opinions and observations might be a bit mistaken, so correct me if I come to the wrong conclusion about any of them.
WYRMREST ACCORD
Pros:
- Overall, the quality of roleplaying is a bit more sophisticated. There are less trolls seeking to disrupt RP, and if there are inexperienced RPers trying to engage with the community, they are usually the type who are eager to learn and not afraid to admit to their mistakes. Likewise, those with experience are not afraid to lend a helping hand to those who are still learning, and every effort seems to be given by many folks here to improve an individual’s opportunity for learning and developing their character(s).
- Toxicity and hostility between members of the community here is, at least on the surface, a very rare sight. Most folks here are very friendly towards one another, and the vast majority of serious RPers are more than happy to do what they can to make you feel welcome on the server. You’ll never have a shortage of potential friends to make, and as already stated above, many folks here are happy to mentor you as you begin your journey through WRA and the RP community here.
Neutrals:
- The server’s general consensus on the interpretation of established lore is very much on the conservative side, with very little wiggle-room to explore more creative ideas due to the fact that it may or may not sit in a sort of ‘gray-area’ in regards to its compatibility with established canon. I believe that this stems from the general Anti-Moon Guard mentality among many people on WRA, and while it is a good idea to distance oneself from certain aspects of Moon Guard, taking this too far can lead to a stifling of creativity and unique ideas to a certain degree.
- If you use TRP3 or any other similar RP profile add-ons, you’ll likely see a large amount of folks walking around with some variations and mixtures of “LGBTQ+ Friendly”, “Black Lives Matter”, “Trans Rights”, and other such messages included in their OOC information. I believe that this by itself is certainly not a bad thing, as every community should strive to be open and friendly to anyone of good conscience who expresses a genuine interest in becoming part of the community, regardless of gender, ethnicity, orientation, and so on. However, through personal experience, I have found that there is a sizeable minority of folks with these kinds of messages in their OOC info who are either A: Being insincere and simply ‘virtue signaling’ to the public, while actually spouting transphobic/homophobic/racist/sexist rhetoric in private, or B: Being a bit /too/ sincere, in the sense that they may begin to harass and attack anyone who shows even the slightest of differing opinions to their views. This is very much a case-by-case basis, but I figured I’d bring it up regardless, since it can be interpreted as a pro or a con depending on your perspective.
Cons:
- Public Walk-up RP is a bit on the scarce side, with hotspots such as the Cathedral district, Blue Recluse, Pig 'n Whistle, and other such prominent RP areas seeing anywhere between 5-10 people each on busy days. More focus seems to be given towards guild-based RP. If you want the best RP experience, you’ll probably have to join a guild to find it and participate in it, but quite a few of the active and dedicated RP guilds have a long application process, and even after that, opportunities to participate in guild events in any noticeable way can be few and far between.
- A cliquey and elitist mentality seems to be present in quite a few guilds, and it appears to be the most common among noble/house guilds, but it’s not unheard of in other types of RP guilds. This can also lead to some inter-guild rivalries and conflicts of interest between cliques, which may develop into a potent source of drama, one that may not be so apparent from the outside, but is very much apparent when you’re part of the in crowd. Because of the cliquishness, coupled with the rivalries and competitive behavior between guilds, large-scale server-wide events are also rather uncommon.
MOON GUARD
Pros:
- Public Walk-Up RP is /the/ reigning form of RP on Moon Guard. On most days, player turnout at the usual hotspots tends to stay steady at around 20-30, and can sharply increase during the busiest of times. The characters and groups you are likely to encounter are very diverse, and if you’re curious about trying a new form of RP, chances are there are a number of other folks on Moon Guard who are doing the very same type, and they’d be happy to have you along for the ride.
- While cliques and elitism are still present on Moon Guard, as no RP realm is truly devoid of such issues (let’s be honest, drama and cliques are as much a part of RP as fish piss is a part of the ocean), they are not as much of an issue for Moon Guard as they are on Wyrmrest Accord. More emphasis is seemingly put on the community of Moon Guard as a whole, rather than a collection of guilds and smaller sub-communities sharing the same server. As such, server-wide events are more common, with the largest such events having potentially hundreds of players turning up to participate. This kind of thing is not impossible on WRA, but it definitely does not happen as frequently as on MG.
Neutrals:
- Interpretation of lore is a lot more fast and loose here than on WRA, allowing for more opportunities to explore more creative avenues of RP. This level of creative freedom has also led to efforts by the leading figures of the community to establish a sort of ‘server lore’ that a large majority of the community tends to abide by. Learning about this server lore has been interesting and alluring to me, and while there might be some smaller aspects of it I personally disagree with, there’s tons more that I consider to be very clever and innovative. Of course, this can lead to a lot of debates about the validity of such lore, and with creative freedom comes a fairly sizeable amount of players who may take that freedom too far.
Cons:
- Compared to WRA, roleplaying quality overall is not quite as refined or sophisticated. You are very likely to find at least one Mary Sue or canon-breaker on your travels, and for more seasoned RPers this can be a bit jarring. Trolls are something that is nearly unavoidable if you spend a lot of time on MG, and while most of these offenders tend to stay in Goldshire, they sometimes leak into Stormwind simply due to the close proximity. If you stay out of Goldshire, you’re a lot less likely to encounter these types of people, but that doesn’t mean you’ll be completely safe from them.
- The unfortunate situation as I see it is that the community of Moon Guard does seem to have a larger amount of toxic and hostile folks in it when compared to WRA. This isn’t to say that the community overall is unwelcoming and toxic by default, far from it, the vast majority of serious RPers on MG that I’ve interacted with seem to be very much likeable and respectable people, but WRA does have them beat in terms of how inviting the community truly is from the outside. I believe this perception is primarily the result of all those horror stories coming out of Goldshire, which paints a bad image for the server as a whole, but even venturing out of Goldshire and interacting with people in Stormwind, there is a very slight amount credence behind this perception from what I’ve encountered.
There’s my observations. I may have missed a few things, and again, I’d love to hear the opinions of others regarding the differences between MG and WRA, as well as their suggestions on how to make my RP experience on either server a much better one.
